For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do. Nothing, as a comment on this verse, can be better than the following remarks of Hedge: 'The numerous passages quoted by commentators in illustration of this and the preceding verses (see Grotius and Wetstein), though they may throw light upon the language, are expressive of feelings very different from those of the apostle. When an impenitent man says he is sorry for his sins, he may express the real state of his feelings; and yet the import of this language is very different from what it is in the mouth of a man truly contrite. The word sorrow expresses a multitude of very different feelings. Thus, also, when wicked men say they approve the good, while they pursue the wrong, their approbation is something very different from Paul's approbation of the law of God. And when Seneca calls the gods to witness, "that what he wills he does not will" (quod volo me nolle), he, too, expresses something far short of what the language of the apostle conveys. This must be so, if there is any such thing as experimental or evangelical religion-that is, if there is any difference between the sorrow for sin and desire of good in the mind of a true Christian, and in the unrenewed and willing votaries of sin, in whom conscience is not entirely obliterated.'